In Somniis Verum
by Thescarredman
Summary: Cover by Taerkitty, pic by Surica. It's an open secret that the cyborgs dream, sometimes vividly. It's a closer secret that the handlers do too.
1. Chapter 1

Through his binoculars, Jean watched the Padania hitman sprawl across the tar roof, a dark pool spreading under his still form. "One shot, one kill, Rico. You shouldn't have fired twice." He lowered the glasses to the motorcade, rolling in serene ignorance past the ambush point, and was about to put them away when he realized that Rico's reply hadn't been her usual _yes, sir_. "_What_ did you say?"

The little cyborg lifted her rifle from the sill at the edge of the roof. "I said, blow it out your ear, Jean." She rested her bipod on the surface of the roof next to her case and removed the scope from the rail. "You know I didn't have a decent first shot. He was kneeling behind the sill, and his head was masked by the rocket launcher. All I had was his arm and shoulder. I had to knock him down first. Maybe if you hadn't gone cheap buying an informant, you might have gotten one who'd tell us this guy was left-handed, and we'd have picked a different position."

He said, "Have you lost your_ mind_?"

"Hmp. That's a fine thing to say, coming from a man who has conversations with his dead sister."

His jaw clenched. "You don't talk about her."

"And why not? My life is tied tighter to Enrica Croce than anyone's. Even 'Etta's." She began to break down the Dragunov and nest the pieces in her case. "Some people hear the name you gave me and think you're just trying to prove something about me. But there are a few who know your history, and wonder if you ever called your little sister 'Rica. They're pointed in the right direction, but way short of the target. I know the real reason."

"Oh, do you _really_." He drew a breath to say more, but she plowed on.

"I do. The same reason you picked a 'candidate' who resembles you enough to be your child. The same reason you cut my hair short and dress me in clothes that make me look like a boy." She snapped the case shut and looked up at him, eyes steady. "You and Jose aren't so different. You both chose surrogates."

Jean's words dried up in his mouth.

"Dante killed five with his bomb that day, not four. Did you and Sofia have two names picked out, or did you know the baby's gender already? Not that it matters. I was never going to have a girl's name. Revenge is man's work, after all." She picked up the case and stood waiting. "You're a hard father, Jean. Sometimes I wonder why I love you." She gave him a sharp look. "Don't say it. Conditioning makes you the center of my world when you're near. It doesn't make me miss you when you're gone."

Jean said, almost growling, "I don't need your damned love. And you're not my child." He looked around for the stair they'd used to reach the roof, but there was nothing close by, and the top of the building was strangely hard to see for any distance in the fading light. Something bothered him about that: hadn't the motorcade passed by in bright sunshine? Where had this darkness come from?

"I know. I'm just a tool, a hunting dog. It's what you tell everyone. But sometimes you forget. The way Jose sometimes forgets he's just pretending that 'Etta's his sister Enrica so that he can stand to be around her. And we want so much to be perfect for you both, we play the role you give us, even when you tell yourselves it's not really what you want, because we know better. Henrietta is Jose's chance to deal with his regrets, to do and say everything he ran out of time for with Enrica. But I'm your unborn son's chance to avenge his mother's murder."

Jean's legs felt leaden. The darkness had closed to deny him sight of anything beyond the immediate area; the sky above was black and featureless. He had the strangest feeling that they weren't on the roof anymore, though they were still in some high place, maybe higher than before. "What's going on here?"

"Not sure." She looked around; Jean wondered if her cybernetic eyes were able to pierce the gloom, or if she was as blind as he. Her gaze returned to him. "Waiting, I think."

The air filled with a tinkling sound. It might have been a titter; it might have been breaking glass. They turned to see an apparition regarding them from the edge of the darkness. "Oh, big brother," Enrica said, "even your little tool sees through you. Your heart may be stone, but your thoughts are no more subtle than a little boy's. And as selfish." She drew closer. "I wonder. If the child had lived, would you have used him just as heartlessly as you treat his replacement? After all, it isn't love that motivates you, now, is it?"

Rico stepped between them and drew her sidearm, pointing it at the spectre. "Go away. You don't belong here."

The vision opened her mouth wide in an expression that showed too many teeth to be a smile. "I? I don't belong here, you miserable little robot?"

"You're not her," Rico said, her aim steady. "She loved him. Living or dead, she would never be so cruel."

"What do you know about it? Who's ever loved you?" The apparition's eyes were daggers. "Who's _ever_ loved you?"

"I know it when I see it," Rico said, unperturbed. "And I'm not much good at lying, but I know a liar when I hear one."

"You don't know anything you're not told. Look at you, trying to threaten me with a pistol, because it's all you know. As if a bullet could touch me. Pathetic."

"Don't be so sure," Rico said, unwavering. "They're dream bullets, after all."

Suddenly the apparition seemed far older – a child still, but marked somehow by years of sin and suffering. She studied Rico's face, then turned, speaking to the little cyborg as she held Jean's eye. "All right," she said, "for now. But don't think this is the end of anything. I'm more a part of him than you will _ever_ be. I'll be with him when you're just spare parts returned to the bins." She stepped backwards into the shadows before she spoke again. "I'll be with him until he dies. Because I have his soul."

_Don't go_, he thought, even though the specter's presence pained him, because he felt a strange certainty that something worse would follow. He was right: he heard a crackling noise, and the ping of metal heating or cooling; he smelled, faintly, the odor of burning fuel. From the darkness came a woman's voice, blurred with pain, but still instantly familiar: "…Jean…"

His nerves caught fire. He rushed into the darkness. "_Sofia_!"

Jean opened his eyes to regard a dim white square: some light source outside coming through his bedroom window to illuminate the ceiling. He was in his room at the compound, he remembered, and wondered why he had wakened; it still felt like the middle of the night. He felt his heart slowing, and guessed he'd had a bad dream. He sniffed at the air, unknowingly searching for some scent, but there was nothing but a faint burnt-dust smell from the heat register. He brushed at his eyes to knock the sleep away, and was surprised to find wetness on his cheeks.

He decided he wasn't getting back to sleep right away, and thought of taking a walk, perhaps raiding the kitchen. To think was to act; he threw back the covers and planted his feet on the floor. He put a robe on over his boxers, and slippers on his feet, and ventured out.

He padded down the dim and silent halls, encountering no one, not really headed for the kitchen, just walking. So many of the buildings were interconnected, he thought, he could walk for kilometers without going outside if he wanted. He tried to recall the dream that had wakened him, but got only a feeling of loss. His mind fell into a sort of blank state where he just followed his feet while fleeting images drifted through his half-awake mind.

He was neither surprised nor unsurprised when he found himself in the cyborg dorm, in front of Rico and Henrietta's door.

The door swung silently open under his hand. The dim light from the hallway washed into the little room and touched the bunk beds stacked against the wall. In the top bunk was a hump in the covers that must be Henrietta. But in the bottom one, Jean saw Rico's blonde head lying on the pillow, and her form under the sheets, lying on her side with her knees drawn up. He began to draw the door shut when she stirred. "Jean?"

"Go back to sleep," he said quietly.

Instead, she sat up, wiping at her eyes. "Is something wrong?"

He glanced at the top bunk: no movement. He felt an eerie certainty that, were Jose standing at this door, it would be Henrietta stirring awake and Rico dead to the world. "No. I was just passing by and decided to look in."

She took in his clothing, and instantly came into focus. "Are you not sleepy?" She flipped back her covers and swung her legs out of the bed. She was dressed in the bed jacket and pants he'd bought her last Christmas. "What time is it?"

"Late," he said. "I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep, that's all. I'll be ready to go back to bed after a little walk."

"Okay." She padded towards him without stopping for her slippers, as if afraid he might leave her behind at the slightest delay.

"Stop." But instead of ordering her back to bed again, he said, "Don't come flapping out into the hall like a barefoot savage. Get your slippers. I'll wait."

They set off, not speaking yet aware of each other's presence, passing from hallway to hallway, building to building. Jean ambled along, letting Rico set the pace. After awhile, he decided to turn back toward the dormitory building and send his cyborg back to bed. "Rico. This way." He gestured to turn his little companion, then resumed walking when she was alongside.

"Jean? Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"The other girls all walk behind their handlers half the time, even Triela and Henrietta. Why do you always want me to walk beside you?"

"Isn't it obvious?" He placed a hand at the back of her neck and gave her head a little shake. "I need to keep an eye on you."


	2. Chapter 2

Marco Toni jerked awake and sat up, eyes wide and staring. He blinked rapidly, gasping, until he returned to the world around him. When he realized he wasn't blind, and recognized his surroundings, he shook with relief. The fire and pain of the bombing outside the DCP Building faded into memory. But even knowing he was in his own room at the compound, he couldn't help glancing down into his lap.

_Sometimes I felt so sad. But only when I was alone. When I was with you, everything was okay._

She wasn't there. But then, when she had been, he hadn't even realized. She'd been bleeding and unconscious and dying, almost in his arms, and his concern for himself had blocked out everything else.

For suppressing conscience, conditioning had nothing on self-interest.

-0-

The night sky was clear, and the moon nearly full; the columns and statuary of the mausoleum shone palely in its light. There was no lighting inside; the only illumination came through the windows and the open door, but for Marco's night-adjusted eyes it was enough. Truly, he could have found her with his eyes closed.

The marble panel marking Angelica's burial niche was thirty centimeters square. The space behind it, Marco knew, was somewhat smaller, reduced by the granite walls separating it from those beside and above: twenty centimeters or so, a dimension spanned by two clenched fists. The depth was about the same. At the brief service, the open niche had seemed damned close quarters for a person's final resting place.

He'd been wrong. The Agency wasn't about to burn up millions of euros' worth of recyclable cybernetics for appearance's sake, even if those components had all been combustible, which they weren't. After they'd first removed everything that hadn't belonged to Angelina, what had come out of the crematorium had fit into a metal box that would scarcely have accommodated a wristwatch.

When he'd placed the box inside the niche, the space had looked very large. And still very empty.

He went down on one knee to touch the marker; the cyborgs' crypts were almost on the bottom row – easily overlooked, and difficult to see even if you were searching for them. He touched the inscription, which simply said, 'ANGELICA', followed by the date of her death. No starting date – what would they have put down? Angelina's birthdate? The date the conditioning had washed away the last of the injured child's memories, and Marco began calling her by her new name? The day they fitted her into her new body? The gap between beginning and end would have been embarrassingly narrow, regardless of the choice.

He brushed his fingertips over the single name. He hadn't been asked about burying her as 'Angelica Toni'. Elsa, just two places down, lay behind a marker as simple and short as Ange's, as did Beatrice and Sylvia on the other side of the room. It was another calculation, intended to offer a show of respect to Section Two's lost dolls yet make their memorials as uninformative and forgettable as possible. Marco was sure that, when time ran out for Victor's cyborg, he'd insist she be buried as 'Triela Hartmann', no matter how loudly Lorenzo grumbled; probably Sandro's redhead would be interred as 'Petra Ricci' as well. But he doubted that Rico would go to her final rest behind two names – or Henrietta either, despite all Jose's gifts and kindnesses. It was a decision Marco had been glad not to make.

He asked himself, as he did every time, why he kept coming here. He hadn't shed a tear for her since her death. When he knelt in this spot and touched the stone, the only emotion he could identify was self-disgust. If that was all there was for him here, why did he continue to punish himself? Why not just walk away, take another cyborg as he'd vowed to do, and get on with his life?

His determination to train another girl had softened in the months since Ange's death; self-doubt had crept into his thoughts and found root. How would he do a better job with a second 'borg? Would he shower her with gifts? Take her on little vacation trips? Visit her in his off hours? Would that make him a better handler?

Would he tell her the story?

He sighed heavily and straightened. Brushing at his knee, he turned and started at Triela standing two steps behind him.

"What are you doing here?" He said, embarrassed.

The slender little blonde looked uncomfortable as well. She was dressed in shorts and a sweatshirt, very unlike her, and her hair was down as well; he looked down and saw slippers on her feet'

She fussed with a thick lock falling over her shoulder for a moment, then said, "Trying to feel something." She stared at the inscription. "I come here about once a week, when something reminds me of her. Each time, I think maybe it will be different, that I'll cry, or beat on the stone. Something. But it's always the same. I come close, and … this wall, this thick glass wall, drops down between me and the world, and makes it all unreal."

Marco felt a chill that didn't come from the stone surrounding him. "Conditioning."

"I suppose. But they did us no favors when they took our grief from us." She took a deep breath and let it out. "Remember how she was at first? Before the reboot? When I first woke, it was just the two of us. She was my only friend. She was so kind, and she taught me so much. I guess she was like a big sister to me, even though I was a head taller. Then she went to the clinic for upgrades, and when she came back, she'd forgotten it all. But we were still friends. I looked after her, the way she'd done for me."

She glanced around at the neat rows of square marble tiles on the walls, some inscribed, many not, and the statue in the center of the room. "I know how I should feel when I come here. But it's like when I was in her room afterward, packing up her things. I just feel dull and empty. It makes me feel like I didn't deserve to be her friend." She looked up at him. "Can you understand?"

He remembered Angelica's hand in his as she lay on her hospital bed, and her words: _you haven't done anything you need to apologize to me for._

He turned back to the stone. "I'm sure she would."


End file.
